The following talk is given by Tara Brock, meditation teacher, psychologist and author.

I went to a memorial service for my father-in-law and it was held that one of the oldest friends meeting houses in Pennsylvania.

It's Quaker. It's so quite beautiful sitting in the silence and having different voices speak to who he was.

They spoke to the different ways, who is a very active person in terms of serving peace and social injustice and great listener.

A lot of beautiful qualities, but one that really stood out was compelling as what a happy person he was and how contagious it was.

This isn't because he had an easy life. He was in World War II. He saw incredible horrors. In fact, he was at the very end of the war crossing the Rhine in a boat with a number of other people.

He was the only one that didn't drown. So, like great trauma and loss and he lived his decades with injury from more and so on. His marriage wasn't an easy one.

But he had this quality in him of really appreciating who he was with and appreciating life.

Which had kind of inspired me to speak about the whole realm of happiness tonight.

It reminded me of a teaching from Tick-N-Tack Han that I've always loved, which is it's not enough to suffer.

We must touch peace also, peace and happiness.

So, there is a misunderstanding of Buddhism that the religions fixating on the suffering of our world.

And yet, if you look at the scriptures and the descriptions of the Buddha and his band of monks and nuns, they're very discreet as being quite cheerful as a matter of fact.

They're engaged in this spiritual adventure that felt very radical and very revolutionary.

And they're also involved with Sunga with a sense of community and a sense of serving and meaningfulness.

They're really quite described as quite happy.

And what I thought I'd do is I brought tonight a card that I love of some Tibetan nuns that for those of you that are here,

and we'll see if we can post it somehow.

I invite you to come look at after class because it's one that when I'm getting grim, I look at.

So, the talk will be, I think it's going to be three-part talk, but I don't know, we'll see what we cover.

We'll be on happiness, really, what blocks happiness, different pathways that allow us to connect with really the appreciation and sense of being at home in our lives.

That's possible.

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